My Super Sweet 18 (Guest Blog!)

My lovely wife has asked me to guest blog and it is my pleasure to be doing so this week. She normally writes this blog - remember her...


I, too, am training with Team in Training for New York City marathon and have been enjoying the process so far. It seems crazy that we started over three and a half months ago and are now just under seven weeks to the big day. It's exciting and scary all at the same time!

When we started training, our "slow, conversational pace" runs were around 3 miles. I remember thinking for years that a 3 mile run was a long run and I always felt like I accomplished something when i was done. My nutrition, hydration, form and overall skill level were not anywhere near where they should be and that was a big reason for me joining TNT. The 3-milers we started with turned into 4-5 miles, then we were at 10 before knew it! I now have two 18-mile runs under my belt. I never thought i would say (or type) that! My first was a training run a couple weeks back and my other was a race yesterday in Central Park.

The race I am referring to if the "ING NYC Marathon 18-Mile Tune-up". The term "tune-up" makes it sound less intimidating but the whole "18 mile" part compensates for that. The race is essentially a long training run for people doing a fall marathon. Typically our distance days are long, slow runs. This week, it was an actual race! We do a lot of training in central park and I still love the park. Everyone I talk to with TNT gets sick of the park but I still have nothing but love for it! Maybe it is my love for John Lennon as I walk through Strawberry Fields each day. Maybe it is the awesome history or the feeling of escaping the city, all while you are still in the center of NYC. Either way, on a nice day, I am always up for a run through the land of Holden Caulfield...

Back to the race, it is 3-full laps of the park. A lap of the park is, for your reference, 6 miles. It is repetitive but allowed for me to break the race into 3 parts. My goal was to run each lap of 6 miles faster than the previous lap. I executed my plan and finished about 3 minutes faster than my goal time. The weather was awesome and the course was very familiar, which was great. The final lap was tough to keep the energy level up (especially toward the end) but I just kept pushing on. I could not help but think of the 80's song "The Final Countdown", which made me think of this:

Arrested Development, gone too soon!

Christie came to cheer me on and seeing her on the final lap, right after mile 13, gave me a great energy boost! Just after mile 14, I was running next to a guy who had his ipod on but was mumbling every few words. I heard, "...speedway...into town...county line...daddy's garage." Once I heard, "daddy's garage", I knew what was happening - our hero Bruce Springsteen's "The Promised Land". How fitting, seeing the blog is named in honor of Bruce!

Overall it was a great race and awesome experience to have when heading toward the finish line on November 7th! Maybe, just maybe, between now and then I will guest blog again...